Chan Shih-Hsuan, Wang Lu-Hai
Institute of Molecular and Genomic Medicine, National Health Research Institutes, 35 Keyan Road, Zhunan Town, Miaoli County, 35053, Taiwan.
J Biomed Sci. 2015 Jan 23;22(1):9. doi: 10.1186/s12929-015-0113-7.
MicroRNAs (miRNAs) are a class of endogenous small non-coding RNAs that have been found highly conserved among species. MiRNAs are able to negatively regulate gene expression through base pairing of 3' UTRs of their target genes. Therefore, miRNAs have been shown to play an important role in regulating various cellular activities. Over the past decade, substantial evidences have been obtained to show that miRNAs are aberrantly expressed in human malignancies and could act as "OncomiRs" or "Tumor suppressor miRs". In recent years, increasing number of studies have demonstrated the involvement of miRNAs in cancer metastasis. Many studies have shown that microRNAs could directly target genes playing a central role in epithelia-mesenchymal-transition (EMT), a cellular transformation process that allows cancer cells to acquire motility and invasiveness. EMT is considered an essential step driving the early phase of cancer metastasis. This review will summarize the recent findings and characterization of miRNAs that are involved in the regulation of EMT, migration, invasion and metastasis of cancer cells. Lastly, we will discuss potential use of miRNAs as diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers as well as therapeutic targets for cancer.
微小RNA（miRNA）是一类内源性小非编码RNA，已发现其在物种间高度保守。miRNA能够通过与靶基因的3'非翻译区（UTR）碱基配对来负调控基因表达。因此，miRNA已被证明在调节各种细胞活动中发挥重要作用。在过去十年中，已获得大量证据表明miRNA在人类恶性肿瘤中异常表达，并可作为“致癌miRNA”或“肿瘤抑制miRNA”。近年来，越来越多的研究表明miRNA参与癌症转移。许多研究表明，微小RNA可直接靶向在上皮-间质转化（EMT）中起核心作用的基因，EMT是一个使癌细胞获得运动性和侵袭性的细胞转化过程。EMT被认为是驱动癌症转移早期阶段的关键步骤。本综述将总结近年来有关参与调节癌细胞EMT、迁移、侵袭和转移的miRNA的研究发现及特征。最后，我们将讨论miRNA作为癌症诊断和预后生物标志物以及治疗靶点的潜在用途。
